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Yom Kipur "

What a blessings it is to be on fire to fulfill one’s purpose for living. One of the most potent antidotes to feeling low or miserable is having a purpose and passionately propelling oneself towards it.

As an ardent boating enthusiast, I find the behavior of the Bible’s most famous mariner, Jonah, to be quite baffling. At the height of a furious storm that threatened the survival of their ship, the terrified sailors cast their cargo overboard to lighten the vessel. Obviously, during such a tempest the safest location is high up on the struggling vessel from where escape might at least be possible. That is why lifeboats on every ship are found on the upper deck. Nobody in his right mind would voluntarily remain far down in the belly of the boat.

“But Jonah descended down into the bilges of the ship, lay down and fell fast asleep.” (Jonah 1:5)

Clearly this was a man without a worry in the world. But don’t envy him. Only the dead have no worries. That’s the clue. To Jonah, dying was not that different from his living existence.